Mel Brooks Creates a Hilarious Science Experiment: A Retro Review for “Young Frankenstein”

Peter Boyle and Gene Wilder in "Young Frankenstein"
Photo Credit: Imdb.com

*With movie theaters closed for the time being, I’m taking this time to review classics that I have yet to see.  I’m going to try to do these Retro Reviews as often as I can until the theaters reopen.  Hope you enjoy them!

Between movies like “Blazing Saddles,” “Spaceballs,” and “Robin Hood: Men in Tights,” Mel Brooks developed a superb career in taking certain types of movies and providing them with a comedic spin.  One of his earliest examples is the 1974 horror-comedy, “Young Frankenstein,” which lampoons Mary Shelley’s literary creation to give us a monster movie that has as many laughs as Frankenstein’s castle has cobwebs.

Dr. Frederick Frankenstein (Gene Wilder) is a lecturing physician at an American medical school who’s been troubled by the fact that he’s the grandson of Victor Frankenstein.  He soon learns that he has inherited his family’s estate in Transylvania and travels there to take a look at the property.  While there, he will follow in his grandfather’s footsteps and create his own monster.

Wilder, who worked with Brooks on “The Producers” and “Blazing Saddles,” provides a fun performance that sees his character making a transformation from a professor to a crazed scientist, a transformation that’s cleverly hinted at when his character is teaching a class at the start of the film, where he goes from calm to crazed when a student brings up Frederick’s lineage.  It’s a moment that has you looking forward to how his character will adopt the mad-scientist persona that we all know from the original “Frankenstein” film, and Wilder delivers.  When Wilder arrives to this part of his character, he has an unhinged gleam in his eye that toes the line perfectly between the passion of the Dr. Frankenstein from the original film and a terrific comedic edge.  It’s a performance that’s a wonderful compliment to Wilder’s work in “Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory,” bringing a sense of witty unpredictability that helps make this move as fun as it is.

Peter Boyle delivers an excellent physical performance as Frankenstein’s monster.  With the way he walks, displays some very humorous facial expressions, and elicits other unintelligible sounds as his form of speech, it all helps make for a superb new take on the iconic monster.  This is all heightened to tremendous effect in a comedic sequence where he and Frederick perform Irving Berlin’s “Puttin’ On the Ritz” in a crowded theater, delivering a highlight in the truest sense.

Marty Feldman’s portrayal of Igor, Frederick’s servant, is an absolute delight as we see him hobbling and bumbling along, helping out Frederick and getting into some very funny mishaps along the way.  Right from his first scene, you know that he’s going to make you laugh every second that he’s on screen, and he succeeds in doing that, bringing us a character who keeps you wanting more and more of him, despite him having an ample amount of screen time.

The screenplay by Brooks and Wilder takes a story that everyone knows and gives it an invigorating twist.  The duo exhibits a talent for developing humorous sequences that unfold with a magnificent balance of visual and verbal humor that make the outrageous situations of the film so memorable.  Unlike the parody movies that have come out over the last 20 years, their narrative doesn’t rely on easy gross-out gags to evoke laughs, but instead relies on the cleverness of their writing, both in terms of setup and dialogue.

Other than the comedic aspects, the narrative has a slightly emotional undercurrent that focuses on the monster and Frederick coming to terms with who he is, and this is something that’s brought to the forefront within the last few minutes where one of the characters (I won’t say which, as I have to give away a humorous plot point if I explain it any further).

The monster doesn’t come alive until around the hour mark, so that gives us plenty of time to see the witty interplay between Frederick, Igor, and Inga (Teri Garr), Frederick’s assistant, as they try to get accustomed to each other.  This allows for the hilarity to build among them as they try to figure out how to make Frederick’s reanimation experiment succeed.  Once the monster is added to the mix, this offer up many other possibilities for this group of characters, and you’ll enjoy everything that you see.

Brooks provides the movie with all of the touches of a classic horror movie.  The cinematography by Gerald Hirschfeld has the movie shot in black-and-white, which provides the movie with the feel of director James Whale’s “Frankenstein” from 1931.  This is just one of many examples of Brooks showing a strong dedication to using the traditional technical aspects of early monster movies while mixing in his brand of humor.

As Frederick screams to the heavens, “Give my creation life,” you’ll see that Brooks has done that with “Young Frankenstein,” a movie full of life that will have you dying from laughter.

Grade: A